"Building rights" is a verbal shortcut: it does not refer to a single figure, but to the whole set of rules that determine what you can build on a plot. Before buying, extending or filing a project, you need to know where those rules are written down and how to read them together.
A reconstruction, not a document
No official document is titled "building rights of plot X". The potential has to be reconstructed by cross-referencing several pieces — zone, index, building envelope, RDPPF. These levers, and the way they fit together, are detailed in the guide what can I build on my plot.
This guide focuses on the practical step: which pieces to gather, where to obtain them, and how to read them together — without forgetting the one almost everyone forgets, the land register.
The official pieces to gather
| Piece | What it tells you | Where to find it |
|---|---|---|
| Land-use plan | Zone and permitted use | Municipality / canton |
| Municipal building regulations | Index, heights, setbacks | Municipality |
| RDPPF extract | Enforceable restrictions | RDPPF (OEREB) cadastre |
| Land register extract | Easements, real charges, annotations (provisional), notes (mentions) | Land register |
| RegBL | Existing buildings and dwellings | Federal Statistical Office |
Cross-referencing the sources: from rule to volume
Taken in isolation, each document is misleading. A generous index is useless if the boundary setbacks shrink the envelope to a narrow strip; a building zone says nothing about an RDPPF building line that encumbers the front of the plot. The real building rights are the intersection of all these constraints, not their sum.
It is precisely this cross-referencing — zone × index × building envelope × RDPPF × easements — that takes expertise, because the sources are scattered and written in different languages.
The reservations that escape the plan
Several rights entered in the land register appear neither in the regulations nor always in the RDPPF — and the vocabulary covers distinct realities:
- easements (right of way, distance, prohibition on building) and real charges (charges foncières);
- annotations (personal rights made enforceable against third parties: right of pre-emption, restriction on the right to dispose);
- notes (mentions), which often refer to public-law restrictions.
Check quickly, then confirm
For a first reading, the zone and the RDPPF already provide the framework in a few minutes. Confirmation, on the other hand, requires reading the applicable regulations and the land register extract. Parcellis automates the first step: from an address, the report identifies the plot, reads the official sources and distinguishes what is confirmed from what remains to be verified.